


Alpaca One For You

by leiascully



Category: Pushing Daisies
Genre: Community: fluff_friday, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-05
Updated: 2008-12-05
Packaged: 2017-10-03 05:08:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Emerson Cod was pleased.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alpaca One For You

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline: S2  
> A/N: Yay for [**fluff_friday**](http://community.livejournal.com/fluff_friday/)! Literally fluffy, in this case.  
> Disclaimer: _Pushing Daisies_ and all related characters are the property of Bryan Fuller and ABC. No profit is made and no infringement is intended.

Emerson Cod was pleased. Although as a rule, he did not knit in public, preferring to avoid the questions that inevitably arose, his new skein of alpaca was too soft to resist. He had bought it on impulse: it had been the last skein, and though it was a pale shade of pink, a color that Emerson generally avoided, the hand of it was luxurious enough to make up for the fact that he had very little idea of how to use it. He had brought along a pattern for a short scarf that he thought his mother might like. Emerson had his yarn. Emerson had his needles. Emerson had a cup of coffee and a slice of triple berry pie à la mode. The life of Emerson Cod was a pleasant thing.

"My life is pleasant," he said aloud, chuckling to himself.

"Well, of course it is!" chirped Olive Snook, sashaying up to the table with her coffee pot. She freshened his cup. "The triple berry is my special pie today. I've lavished all my love and attention on it."

Emerson snorted. "Ain't none of your love and attention that makes this pie so good. It's the Piemaker makes the pies, not love." He drawled out the last word, trying to drive her away, but she squealed and picked up his yarn.

"Oooh!" she said. "It's so soft! What are you gonna make?"

Emerson Cod did not in general enjoy questions about his fiber-related habit, but Olive's delight softened his heart enough that he did not immediately chase her away. "Not sure yet," he admitted. "I was gonna make something for Momma, but pink ain't exactly her color." As a matter of fact, Emerson felt that the delicate yarn needed to be used for a delicate project, and his mother was not much for lace and fripperies. She was a woman for a good sturdy cable knit, as she had often told them: in their line of work, they knew how dangerous it was to go around shedding fibers willy-nilly, and alpaca would do just that.

Olive, meanwhile, was holding the hank to her face. Her eyes were squeezed shut with pleasure as she rubbed her cheek against his yarn. She looked, Emerson thought, like Digby getting his ears scratched. The thought occurred to him that Olive _was_ suited to fripperies, and that the pink of the yarn complemented her complexion in a way that it would never compliment his or his mother's or, if he dared, Simone's, and that, in fact, after the help she had given them in their last few investigations, he owed her.

"Oh, hell," he said, and snatched the yarn back. Olive looked momentarily bereft.

"It's beautiful," she said. "Thank you, Emerson." She picked up her coffee pot and walked back to the counter. Emerson ate his pie, thoughtfully, and looked at the pattern he had been about to cast on, also thoughtfully. He watched Olive bounce around the Pie Hole, chatting with the customers. He felt a pang of what he first thought might be indigestion, but on consideration, he found it was remorse. He had been almost cruel to Olive, who had been kind to him, as she almost always was. Emerson finished his pie and picked up his yarn. He would not knit in public this time.

Emerson Cod went home and looked through his pattern books until he found the perfect pattern: a lacy tam o' shanter that would not fit his head, but would, no doubt, fit the blonde and perky head of Olive Snook. He settled into the familiar rhythm of knitting together and yarning over, pleased with his project. It was, he knew, not going to resolve the fundamentally irritating nature of their friendship - Olive would, if anything, annoy him with her squealing - but he was a man who liked to settle his debts. Plus, this one involved more fleecy yarn and fewer dead bodies or quantities of blood, and that was a pleasant change.

"My life is pleasant," said Emerson aloud, and grinned. And it was true.


End file.
